


parabolic reflection

by implodingpotato



Category: The Bifrost Incident - The Mechanisms (Album), The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Eldritch Lyf, Gen, some eldritch-flavored body horror later on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:06:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24403282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/implodingpotato/pseuds/implodingpotato
Summary: Lyf's daemon has been different since the black box.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 86





	parabolic reflection

**Author's Note:**

> have I been chipping away at a Mechs daemons fic for ages? yes  
> has listening to DTTM live on repeat caused Lyf and the other TBI characters to decide that they deserved their spinoff before I even finished the main fic? also yes

Lyfrassir knows that they’ve been affected by their brush with the Bifrost. Their flight from the Yggdrasil system has had them constantly looking over their shoulder, feeling the weight of Odin’s mad gaze upon them. They don’t sleep, relying on caffeine pills and stubbornness to stay awake. Whenever they do pass out from sheer exhaustion, their dreams are plagued by teeth and claws and undulating masses of flesh, all entwined with strands of bismuth. 

But they could ignore all that, or at least would put a solid effort into pretending, if it weren’t for Voluspa. 

Voluspa had settled as a raven without too much fanfare when Lyfrassir was in their mid-teens. A sign of a sharp and inquisitive mind, they were told. Ideal for an investigative career. Lyfrassir wasn’t sure how much they believed in those old daemon determinism theories but they ended up joining the New Midgard Transport Police anyway. As they rose through the ranks, Voluspa would balefully eye suspects from Lyfrassir’s shoulder or hop onto their desk to provide color commentary on the incident reports that they diligently spent many a late night compiling. 

Now, as they flee towards Hoddmimis in the fastest ship Lyfrassir could get their hands on on such short notice, Voluspa huddles wordlessly and glassy-eyed in the cockpit, the normal slight iridescence of her plumage startlingly vibrant. Lyfrassir takes the ship off autopilot, desperate to distract themself from thoughts of the connection between what they had seen in the black box footage and the current unresponsive state of their daemon. 

It doesn’t help.

  


* * *

  


_Odin’s daemon was a raven as well, an eerie counterpart to Voluspa with feathers so black that light seemed to bend around him. Even through the static-riddled footage recovered from the black box, Lyfrassir could tell that the assembled Asgardian elite gathered at the Ratatosk Express’s launching speech were unsettled by him, their own daemons shifting nervously before the raven's flat-eyed gaze as Odin joyously spoke of conquest. It was rumored that, long ago, Odin had made a deal with the old witch-clans of Mimisbrunnr that granted her daemon the power to fly far from her without harm, that he traveled the Nine Worlds in search of threats to her reign before returning to whisper his findings into her ear._

_Lyfrassir didn’t hold with such gossip, of course; any seemingly preternatural knowledge of Odin’s had surely been conveyed via the perfectly mundane Asgardian secret police and besides, the notion of separating oneself from one’s daemon was simply impossible. Their goal in examining the footage was solely to find the truth about what had happened aboard the train, not to engage with base speculation on the nature of the bond between the former ruler of Asgard and her other self._  


_Still, as Lyfrassir watched the imperious raven daemon swoop throughout the full length of Odin’s carriage while the despot herself stood motionless at the observation window, they couldn’t help but wonder._  


  


* * *

  


When Voluspa finally speaks, five day-cycles into their flight, Lyfrassir startles so hard at the controls that they nearly knock the ship off-course.

“The void...” she croaks. Her eyes flicker faintly with rainbow light. “I hear it singing, Lyf.”

For once, Lyfrassir doesn’t bother with questions, just tightens their grip around the throttle until their knuckles turn white and flies faster.

**Author's Note:**

> just a teaser to start us off—come yell at me about mechs daemon headcanons on tumblr or discord!


End file.
